


Call 'Em Rogues

by commodorecliche



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Break Up, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Love, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-23
Updated: 2015-02-23
Packaged: 2018-03-14 19:55:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3423563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/commodorecliche/pseuds/commodorecliche
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>What they call love is a risk, cause you will always get hit out of nowhere by some wave and end up on your own.</i><br/>Play Crack the Sky || Brand New</p>
            </blockquote>





	Call 'Em Rogues

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a fic request for a Break Up Fic. I kinda ran with it.

It's a quiet evening tonight. 

Sitting alone on my patio, I try to take it in as best I can. Quiet evenings always were my favorite. The season is finally shifting from spring into the heat of summer. The night is warm, the crickets chirp, fireflies shine, and as I stare across the small expanse of grass I can't help but think of the hundreds of hours Marco and I must have spent together out here. 

With a soft exhale, I dig down into my pocket and yank out an unopened pack of cigarettes. I bought them yesterday, because it was only thing I could think to do when this had all slammed down upon my head. Unthinkingly, I grapple carelessly at the plastic wrapping that seals the cigarettes off from me. My fingers fumble, no longer as skilled at yanking the plastic away as they were when I used to smoke a pack every two weeks. I hook my dull, bitten down nail beneath the edge and finally peel the wrapping off, opening it swiftly, and trying my damnedest not to think as I pluck a cigarette out and light it. 

The first inhale is a little too much for me... It's a little too deep, a little too full, a little too hot for my unaccustomed lungs. My body isn't used to this anymore. But I hold it in anyway: exhale with control, inhale a second time, and relearn the taste of ash and nicotine as they stain my tongue. 

With hesitant fingers, each one on the verge of trembling, I pluck the cigarette from my lips. I cradle it between my fingers and exhale, the cloud of smoke building before me before blowing away with the breeze. Here, then gone in an instant. It isn't fair... it isn't fair how it doesn't stay. I wish that it would stay, I wish that I could make it linger, convince it to suffocate me, to refill the empty ache within my chest. 

Staring across the expanse of the yard, I feel nothing but a resounding sense of loneliness as I realize that Marco and I won't sit together on this patio anymore. We won't sing together anymore. We won't laugh, or moan, or wrestle, or kiss amongst the itchy blades of grass. 

That isn't our life anymore. 

I shake my head slowly, lowering my gaze a bit and bringing the cigarette up for another puff. It's easier this time. Smoother and more familiar. 

I don't bother to turn around when I hear the door of the patio slide open then close again. I don't turn around even as the sound of gentle footsteps begin to pad their way towards me. 

"Thought you'd given up smoking..." He says softly once he's beside me. 

All I give him is a _"hmmph"_ and shake my head. A little angry, a little bitter, and mostly just hurting, I purposefully bring the cigarette to my lips to take another drag, if only out of spite. It's his fault I'm doing this anyway. 

I shrug. 

"Yeah, well, I relearned the habit." 

Two nimble fingers suddenly snatch the cigarette from me, plucking it out deftly from between my lips. Looking up, I want to protest or shout at him, but I just can't find it in me. Instead, I watch as Marco takes a brief drag, holds in a choke and his urge to cough, and exhales. He looks at me - all bright brown eyes and dust-speckled skin - and breathes around the smoke. 

"These'll kill you, you know." He croaks.

The scoff I make is barely human, edging towards hysterical and mad. As if Marco even cares, as if any of that even fucking _matters_ right now. 

Marco drops the half-smoked cigarette onto the ground and stomps it out without a moment's hesitation. He drags a chair up beside my own and settles down, keeping his eyes trained on me. But I won't look at him this time. 

"Why are you here, Marco?" 

"I felt like we needed to talk..." 

I shake my head a little, tilting my head back and staring up at the night sky. It's dark - cloud covered and dull - and I wish that I didn't desire so much just to see a star. 

I shrug, divert my gaze back to the ground.

"There's nothing to talk about." 

Marco doesn't reply to that. Instead, he merely sits silently beside me, eyes that I won't meet still focused on me. It's as much as I can do to remind myself to breathe. Inhale... exhale.

When I sigh, the breath trembles past my lips more noticeably than I mean for it to. 

"I wasn't ready for this, Marco..." 

Marco doesn't reply for a moment, and it's easily one of the longest moment's I've experienced so far... And longer moments are sure to come. Long moments that will span the empty nights, long moments in which I will lie in the bed we used to share, and stare at the pillow that used to be Marco's and that now is only mine. Long moments in which I will remember that things went wrong, so very wrong... That things can go wrong no matter how much you love someone. 

"No one ever is." Marco replies softly. I don't mean to, but I glance over at him. He diverts his eyes as soon as mine attempt to catch them. He sits beside me, feet planted flat and firm against the concrete of the patio, twiddling his thumbs as he shrugs nervously and doesn't look at me. "I certainly wasn't..." He mumbles, more to himself than to me, and I can't help but feel a twinge of hostility towards him.

Because _he_ left _me_. What goddamn right does he have to be surprised or upset? 

I look away from him.

"Sometimes... things just happen, Jean."

"It wasn't fair, Marco." I grit through my teeth. "It _isn't_ fair." 

I know how my voice sounds... I can hear it cracking. I know I sound cliche, I know I sound desperate, and it's only because I am. I truly am. I never fucking asked for this, I never once thought we'd end up here. 

"You're right." Marco says softly. "It isn't fair. It never is." I hear him breathe in deeply, and all I can do is think that the sound of his breath - shaky and uneasy and hurt - is out of place. "But it is what it is, Jean... And sometimes... Sometimes the 'right-now' isn't always the right time for two people." 

"It didn't have to be like _this_ , though..." I whisper harshly. 

"What would you have had me do?" He asks gently, and I can tell from his voice that he's hurt. He's scared. And I don't have a right to talk to him so bitterly, so angrily. 

"Some warning..." I murmur to him, "Some sign at all would've been nice." 

Marco laughs beside me - and it's strained and it's painful and acrid - not anything like the Marco's Laugh I loved. 

I see him shaking his head out of the corner of my eye, his eyes panned flat across the yard before us. 

"Warnings are a luxury that love just doesn't allow, you know? Sometimes things just change, Jean." 

He sounds frantic... desperate, as if he needs me to understand. 

"Sometimes things happen so fast you just don't get a warning." He continues before he pauses, turns to me, and places a gentle hand on my forearm. "It doesn't mean that what we had was any less meaningful, and it doesn't mean that I love you any less. It just means that things are different now."

"I never _once_ thought we'd wind up here." I hiss at him, doing my best to control the waiver that threatens every word I say. 

"What, and you think I did? You think I knew this would happen? That we'd end up here? I never wanted it to be like this!" His voice is getting desperate and harsh and I wish to god that I could just fucking block it out, but I can't. Marco pauses for a moment, and in the silence that falls between us, I can't even hear his breaths. But he speaks again, softly this time. "I never wanted this to happen. I love you, Jean... I love you so goddamn much that it hurts. But it isn't our time anymore. It... it isn't our time." 

His last sentence is said with such resignation, such defeat, that it's all I can do not to break. 

"Do you mean that?" I whisper, and I know he knows what I'm asking. I know that he loves me... but I'm asking one last time if this is really it. 

He doesn't answer for a moment, lifting his arm and resting his hand gently on my bicep. He curls his fingers a bit around me, but I can hardly feel his touch, body numb and never ready for his answer. 

"I do..." He croaks out. "Things get bad sometimes, Jean, and sometimes love just isn't enough... love can't always fix it." I won't look at him still, but I don't have to look to know that he's on the verge of breaking. "And I'm sorry." Marco breathes, voice thick and lined with tears he's so unwilling to shed. "I am _so_ sorry." 

I don't hold back anymore. Tears fall, silent but not unnoticed, throat raw with the burn of ash, face red and thick with salt. 

"Why is it over? Why does it hurt so goddamn much? I don't want it to hurt anymore..." 

"I'm sorry." 

My face is wet and eyes are heavy and I can't hold it back anymore. 

"Does it ever get easier?"

The silence that falls between us rends me, and his hand grabs my own and squeezes, laces our fingers together. 

"What do you want me to say?"

"...Lie to me..." I whisper. "Tell me it will be okay." 

I look up at him as he drapes his arm around my shoulders, but my eyes are too wet to see anything but a blur. 

"It will be okay." Marco tells me, his voice the only thing I hear in the darkness now. "I promise... you will be okay..."

**::**

I don't know how long we stay that way, but eventually my tears slow, the ache dies, and all that's left is the arm around my shoulder and the drying salt that's clinging to my cheeks. Marco doesn't speak again.

We stare across the back yard, until the sound of patio door interrupts the silence. 

"Jean?" A voice calls out from behind me. 

I turn my head to look beside me and I'm met with only empty air. No one sits beside me, no chair is pulled up next to mine, and the only cigarette is the one in my hand, barely smoked and burned down to the filter. Not bothering to wipe my eyes, I crane back to look towards the patio door. Reiner stands, halfway through the door and looks at me with sympathy. 

"Hey..." He mumbles, stepping softly towards me. 

"Hey." I whisper back, watching emptily as he crouches by my side in the spot where a chair should have been. The blond rests a gentle hand on my shoulder, gives me a squeeze, looks up at me sympathetically. 

"You've been out here a while... You should... you should try to get some sleep," he tells me gently, sliding his hand to rub at my bicep softly. "The memorial's in the morning." 

"Yeah, you're right." 

My voice is heavy and thick, weighed down by too many thoughts and the too-heavy ache in my chest. 

I turn my gaze away from Reiner, staring out across the backyard, and imagine that Marco sits beside me. 

"Do you want me to stay tonight? I don't mind." Reiner offers gently. 

I shake my head, not bothering to look at him. 

"I'll be fine." 

"It's... it's okay not to be fine, Jean... It's okay not to be fine after... after what happened..."

I can't reply. Reiner simply rubs my arm again comfortingly. 

"We're all gunna miss him, Jean..."

::

_I know that this is what you want._  
 _A funeral keeps both of us apart._  
 _You know that you are not alone._  
 _Need you like water in my lungs._

**Author's Note:**

> Um, yeah, okay, I'm sorry. That wasn't... exactly a break up fic, I know. But honestly, I tried several different things and I couldn't find a good reason that the two of them would break up without one of them just dying, so I killed one. Yay! WHO LETS ME HAVE NICE THINGS? WHY DO YOU ALLOW ME TO DO THESE THINGS? Someone please stop me. 
> 
> Anyway, sorry about the feels. <3 
> 
> I also have a [tumblr](http://commodorecliche.tumblr.com). You are more than welcome to add me, or message me, or request a fic (I'm officially taking requests now). And I also would love more Jeanmarco peeps on my dash.


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